Emotional Agility

Get Unstuck, Embrace Change, and Thrive in Work and Life

By: Susan David

Narrated by: Susan David

Length: 9 hrs and 21 mins

Publisher's summary

#1 Wall Street Journal Best Seller

Winner of the Thinkers50 Breakthrough Idea Award

Amazon Best Book of the Year

Forbes Recommended Books for Leaders

TED Talk sensation—over 12 million views!

The counterintuitive approach to achieving your true potential, heralded by the Harvard Business Review as a groundbreaking idea of the year.

The path to personal and professional fulfillment is rarely straight. Ask anyone who has achieved his or her biggest goals or whose relationships thrive and you’ll hear stories of many unexpected detours along the way. What separates those who master these challenges and those who get derailed? The answer is agility—emotional agility.

Emotional agility is a revolutionary, science-based approach that allows us to navigate life’s twists and turns with self-acceptance, clear-sightedness, and an open mind. Renowned psychologist Susan David developed this concept after studying emotions, happiness, and achievement for more than twenty years. She found that no matter how intelligent or creative people are, or what type of personality they have, it is how they navigate their inner world—their thoughts, feelings, and self-talk—that ultimately determines how successful they will become.

The way we respond to these internal experiences drives our actions, careers, relationships, happiness, health—everything that matters in our lives. As humans, we are all prone to common hooks—things like self-doubt, shame, sadness, fear, or anger—that can too easily steer us in the wrong direction. Emotionally agile people are not immune to stresses and setbacks. The key difference is that they know how to adapt, aligning their actions with their values and making small but powerful changes that lead to a lifetime of growth. Emotional agility is not about ignoring difficult emotions and thoughts; it’s about holding them loosely, facing them courageously and compassionately, and then moving past them to bring the best of yourself forward.

Drawing on her deep research, decades of international consulting, and her own experience overcoming adversity after losing her father at a young age, David shows how anyone can thrive in an uncertain world by becoming more emotionally agile. To guide us, she shares four key concepts that allow us to acknowledge uncomfortable experiences while simultaneously detaching from them, thereby allowing us to embrace our core values and adjust our actions so they can move us where we truly want to go.

Written with authority, wit, and empathy, Emotional Agility serves as a road map for real behavioral change—a new way of acting that will help you reach your full potential, whoever you are and whatever you face.

©2016 Susan David (P)2016 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

Strategy + Business - Best Leadership Books of 2017

Winner of the 2017 Thinkers50 Breakthrough Idea Award

Winner of the 2016 Books for a Better Life Award in Psychology

Axiom Business Book Awards Medalist

800-CEOREAD Editors' Choice

Forbes.com Recommended Books for Creative Leaders

Facebook #ReadtoLead Selection

LinkedIn's 12 Books on Leadership to Read in 2017

Selection

LinkedIn's 12 Books on Leadership to Read

“I’ve got a flagged, dog-eared, Post-it-ed [version of] Susan David’s incredible book.”—Brené Brown

“Susan David teaches us to understand—and to communicate in—the unspoken language of emotion to better align how we feel with what we do. Essential reading.”—Susan Cain, New York Times-bestselling author of Quiet and Bittersweet

“It’s one thing to feel an emotion—it’s another to gain control over it. Susan David acknowledges the benefits of sadness, anger, guilt, and fear, and then shows us how to make sure they don’t take over our lives. This is a self-help book that might actually help.”—Adam Grant, New York Times-bestselling author of Originals, Give and Take, and Think Again

Must read...

There is not a person I know who wouldn’t benefit from this book. Take a read, it’s unbelievably helpful.

At last, the light overhead is on!

I have read or listened to a lot of books in the psych and social work fields trying to find the best approaches to dealing with feelings. This book really made me have an “ah ha!” moment regarding how I approach (or rather was not approaching) my emotions. Susan David does an excellent job of breaking down the unproductive methods we use to try to manage and compartmentalize our feelings, instead showing us better ways to confront and move past them. I would recommend this to anyone in the field as a helpful tool in communicating how we can control our reactions to our emotions. I’d also recommend this for anyone struggling - learning how to confront emotions is a skill everyone should have.

Give it a chance-keep listening.

The first two chapters were so hard for me to get through. I am so glad I kept listening. I will come back to this book again and again for personal and parenting advice. An excellent book.

Must Read

This is a must read / listen to book.
If you are feeling like you are stuck and struggle with change this book will help you get real and lean into your authentic self.

Recommend

Pretty decent book! Lots of great examples and stories and advice! I recommend it! Yay!

WOW!

Susan David is able to clearly define how emotions can rule us. I found this book to be engaging, intuitive, honest and real. Thank you Susan for a fabulous book regarding feelings and emotions. I have already gone back to the book to remind me of how I need to feel my emotions and be true to who I am❤

Multiple listens

Loved this enough to listen multiple times. It's full of an abundance of insights that make sense to me.

I listen through. Then listened through again.

The best book I've listened to on Audible. Hands down. Would recommend to everyone. No matter where you are in life.

if you have any emotions you have to read it!

A must read book! I read multiple good books about changing your life, career, having crucial conversations etc. They are full of great tips and rules, but all of them lack the core - fundamental princeples of how to live with your emotions. This book fills the gap - it covers emotions in a systematic, succinct and easy to understand manner, while keeping you a bit entertained and hooked.

Don’t be afraid of your emotions

This is a wonderful book on how to face your emotions and the emotions of others and how to grow from them. It teaches you how understanding your emotions adds to the quality of life.